Clumsy Prodigy
by Yotsubadancesintherain5
Summary: Link might've been an expert in combat one hundred years ago, but sleep can make things a little rusty.


The first thing Link did when he woke up and climbed out into the open world was climb a tree. The bark was rough and there was a mushroom growing on the cliff, and it was the first item he collected. He would have kept climbing the tree but he suddenly let go and started to head down the path, like something was nudging him in the direction.

Link suddenly veered off at the last second, before he reached the end of the path, and fell down the cliff. It wasn't a long drop but it still hurt. He shook off the pain and walked back up around the path and found someone else in this place.

The old man took notice of the slate and gave some information on what it was. There was a baked apple on the ground that was practically begging to be picked up but Link resisted.

He took the axe instead and not long after monsters rushed up to attack him. At first, Link tried to swing ineffectually, missing every vital attack on the creatures, but something like a latent knowledge sprung up and before long the monsters disappeared into a purplish black cloud.

He followed the map, getting lost a few times and trying to avoid the monsters, and eventually found the tower. The steps were intimidating but he was bold enough to jump down from the second-to-last step.

The old man flew down with a glider and explained that the cliffs were too dangerous to climb down without it. Link wondered why he didn't try to scale down those cliffs. He was instructed to go into the shrine that tore up from the ground and get the treasure within.

Then it turned out that there were three more shrines he had to go through so he kept going. One of them was in an area with a decayed but still terrifying enemy, a Guardian. Link was more confident with fighting the monsters by then but was not going to face this one.

The most difficult one was the shrine that rested on top of a cliff. The trees that acted as a bridge would sometimes simply fall down into the gap. And climbing over the makeshift bridge was truly heart-pounding, to say nothing of the snarling creatures that met Link on the other side.

The true task was climbing up the cliff, something slow and deliberate. Link lost his grip many times and paid for it by falling down onto the ledges, sometimes hitting the rock as he fell.  
Getting that particular gift from the shrine was certainly rewarding, because it meant he never had to visit that cliff again.

The shrine in the snowy wasteland was almost as difficult, even with the doublet that Link received for reminding the old man of the ingredients for his recipe. There were gelatinous monsters that roamed around, slow but frozen and deadly, and Link would become encased in ice if he struck the monster. That latent knowledge flared again; Link shot arrows into the monsters, from a distance.

Even his doublet couldn't fend off the cold of the river. He fell in trying to get across and the water was _freezing_. Eventually Link found a huge chunk of metal that acted as another makeshift bridge. He went the long way around to avoid fighting the monsters and got the last gift.

Link headed to the Temple of Time, carefully sliding down the slope of the cliff, and going down the path he went after he first woke up. It felt like a lifetime, but he felt like his journey was far from over.  
But he was ready to complete that journey.

**A/N: Originally posted on AO3 on December 2 2017**

**I let my mom's friend's kids play BOTW, with a fresh file so that they could experience it fully; if one of them gets a game over then the other can play kinda rules. Even still, sometimes I have to take over, ha ha. The younger one does not like Bokoblins at all (she makes me fight the 'bad guys') and the older one died immediately when she first started playing because she walked off the cliff. That was an, "Ohhh, no," moment.****  
****I thought it would be fun to write what went down. We haven't gotten past the first area but it's still fun.**


End file.
